As government departments around the world continue to raise the Unix flag in pursuit of hardwareindependent computer solutions SecureWare Inc of Atlanta, Georgia, reckons that its software technology will become the standard way to do security for Unix. Santa Cruz Operation and Hewlett-Packard Co have already opted for the Portable Security Module Package, PSMP, which, when integrated into their Unix kernels acheives C2 security level, according to the US government’s Orange Book requirements. SecureWare says the security extensions – claimed to be a quarter of the price of similar solutions – have also been ported to Apple A/UX, Interactive and Microport Unix. As well as PSMP, SecureWare is offering PSMP Plus, which conforms to B1/B2 levels. B2 is a modular requirement, and Unix International and the Open Software Foundation have claimed that their future Unix offerings will be modular enough to achieve to support B2 security extensions. However, due to the flourishing trade in X Window applications on workstations and servers, the US government which originally intended its standards to be applied to systems running dumb terminals – has awarded five contracts to develop secure system standards incorporating X Window, called the Compartmented Mode Workstation – or CMW – to SecureWare, DEC, IBM, Sun Microsystems and Harris Corp. SecureWare’s CMW sits on top of PSMP Plus and was done for Apple’s A/UX, but it also claims that it is the only version that can be por-ted to any version of Unix, saying it has done the same for every major European vendor except one.
